How to Improve Your Retrospective Part 2 — Setting the Stage

The Retrospective is the most important event in Scrum. Learn why setting the stage for the retrospective is key to maximize the benefits for your team.

This is part two in my series of posts about improving your retrospectives. As I mentioned in my previous post, the retrospective is a key part of the Scrum Framework — I think it is the most important Scrum event.

It is designed to help the team make their processes and practices more effective and enjoyable. This post focuses on the first part of the retrospective where we are setting the stage for the rest of the retrospective meeting.

What is “Set the Stage?”

What is the point of the “Set the Stage” Phase of the Retrospective? Derby and Larsen say it is to get the team to focus, to orient them to the goal of retrospective, and to create an atmosphere for collaboration. Let’s talk about why each of these is important.

If we want to get the maximum benefit from the retrospective in the Scrum methodology, we need the team to come ready to engage and participate.

People are usually coming in to the retrospective from other meetings and may need a…